Incivility
rears its
ugly head
once more

A few incidents in recent weeks have threatened to put an end to the era of civility ushered in by Pat Murphy when she became mayor on Dec. 1, 2003.

And sadly, unless key community leaders do something about it now, those incidents may foreshadow a return to the ugly period of incivility that preceded Mayor Murphy's assuming office.

That would be a shame.

Nobody in the know has been lulled into thinking there has been a cessation of personal animosity between the leading folks on opposite sides of New Milford's longstanding Great Divide - the developer/contractor group sometimes called the Shadow Government and the preservationists symbolized by the Grassroots Coalition and the Northville Residents' Association.

But for more than a year, Mayor Murphy's personal style and her refusal to get drawn into either camp helped create a more civil environment in public life than had existed for several years.

The irony today is that townspeople could not have appeared more unified than they were as recently as Feb. 1, when a good number of traditional political foes stood together in virtual unanimous town meeting support of the purchase of the former reservoir property.

Unfortunately, that apparent harmony didn't last long.

Over the next two weeks, three local commission chairmen resigned - Wallie Jahn from Ethics and Trip Rothschild and Jim Cioban from EDC - amidst controversies that involved the mayor's office, and there were allegations and denials all around.

Since then, the makeup of the Charter Revision Commission has become something of a political football, with matters coming to a head at Monday night's Town Council meeting, when the 15-person charter panel was to be chosen (see related stories).

That should have been a relatively innocous process, but that's not how it turned out, as one big-name Republican was unceremoniously dumped from the slate and another GOP nominee was accused by a Democratic councilman of "malfeasance" in office.

Both the Democratic and Republican town committees had earlier recommended all-star lineups loaded primarily with key, well-known officials or former officials.

Not surprisingly, Mayor Murphy rejected the nomination of Democrat Shelly Pruss, who was her main opponent in the 2003 election, just as she had said "no" to Mr. Pruss' earlier bid to serve on the Board of Finance.

She also ruled out Democrat Joe Ribeiro, who coincidentally was once an opponent of the mayor's fiance, State Representative Clark Chapin.

Some may argue with her decisions, but the reality is that she replaced them with two very good nominees, Warren Braren and Sue Fogarty, who received the seal of approval from the Town Council on Monday.

Ironically, the biggest controversy arose over the choices from the GOP, the party of the mayor and six of the nine council members.

The Republican Town Committee had approved a six-person slate that included attorney Tom Beecher, a longtime town committee member, former town attorney and former Ethics Commission chairman.

The mayor had asked Mr. Beecher to serve, the town committee had given him its blessing, and he had every reason to believe he would be appointed to the commission.

Instead, he was embarrassed to learn - in front of the council and a host of other officials and members of the public - that he had been dumped from the slate.

It's difficult to ascertain exactly what transpired in the process that led the council to appoint attorney Ken Taylor instead of Mr. Beecher, since participants in the decision-making process have told, shall we say, slightly conflicting stories.

The party line is that the GOP favored Mr. Taylor's more recent experience on the Ethics Commission, while some say Mr. Beecher got dumped because of his close ties to former Mayor Art Peitler and former official David Hubbard, whose stars have fallen in the local Republican universe.

Most everyone, Mr. Beecher included, thinks Mr. Taylor - who like Mr. Beecher is a respected, popular, community-minded individual - will make a fine member of the Charter Revision Commission.

But the bottom line is that Mr. Beecher was not given the simple, common courtesy of being told he was being replaced by Mr. Taylor.

He deserved better.

That scenario is somewhat reminiscent of the humiliating experience Mr. Rothschild suffered when he ran for re-election as chairman of the Economic Development Commission Feb. 10.

As it turns out, Mayor Murphy and the Republican Town Committee wanted to see a change of leadership of the EDC, and they backed Jim Cioban.

But they didn't spell that out to Mr. Rothschild, which would have been the right way to handle the matter.

Mr. Rothschild and Mr. Cioban had agreed on a deal - later repudiated by many, including the two principals - by which Mr. Rothschild would remain chairman for a transition period.

After meeting with the mayor, Mr. Cioban decided not to honor the deal, but he didn't notify Mr. Rothschild about his change of heart until a few minutes before the re-election meeting - which Mr. Cioban admirably admitted later was regrettable.

The fact that nobody went straight to Mr. Rothschild and had an honest discussion with him led to a bizarre, embarrassing scenario in which he resigned as chairman and his successor, Mr. Cioban, resigned a few days later.

There is a lesson to be learned from both the Beecher and Rothschild incidents, and hopefully some town officials have learned it.

The lesson is that individuals - town employees, volunteers or just plain residents - deserve to be treated honestly and with respect, whether you agree with them or not.

There were actually bigger fireworks at Monday night's meeting when Councilman Larry Greenspan, pretty much out of the blue, publicly accused Board of Finance member Bob Sherry, a GOP nominee for the charter panel, of "malfeasance" for allegedly holding up payment of a legal bill incurred by a town official accused in an ethics complaint (see related story).

The allegation appeared to stun most everyone, which may explain why nobody pressed Mr. Greenspan to offer proof to support his allegation or came to the defense of Mr. Sherry.

But the upshot is that the public name-calling and personal politics that had disappeared from governmental meetings in New Milford has returned.

The incident also hammers home the reality that the animosity between the two main antagonist groups still exists - and the truth remains that both sides have a history of contributing to the incivility that has plagued this community.

It is ironic that Mr. Greenspan, who a few years ago organized a service of reconciliation at St. John's Episcopal Church to help counter uncivil public behavior in New Milford, should be the one to usher back personal attacks into the public domain.

Wouldn't it have been better had Mr. Greenspan gone to the Board of Finance to pursue the matter in a businesslike manner?

Wouldn't it have been fairer for Mr. Greenspan to talk face-to-face with Mr. Sherry about his concerns?

What ever happened to focusing on the issue instead of attacking the person involved in the issue?

All around the world, a host of cultures believe in what we know as the Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

It would be great for everyone if that credo would catch on in New Milford public life.

But at the very least, we should all hope that officials will learn from the recent acts of incivility - and take steps to put an end to them.

It is up to the mayor, and the members of the Town Council, and other community leaders to set the right example and to use their influence to get others to follow that example.

If they don't do that, there is the very real chance that New Milford will sink back to another deplorable era of incivility.